Day 5

Scripture (Ephesians 4:1-5, 30)

The account of the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost begins with a description of some preparatory signs – the rush of wind and the tongues of fire – but finds its conclusion in the affirmation that “they were all filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:4). Saint Luke – who wrote the Acts of the Apostles – emphasizes that the Holy Spirit is He who ensures the universality and unity of the Church. The immediate effect of being “filled with the Holy Spirit” is that the Apostles “began to speak in other tongues”, and came out of the Upper Room to proclaim Jesus Christ to the crowd (cf. Acts 2:4 et seq.). In so doing, Luke wished to highlight the universal mission of the Church, as a sign of a new unity between all peoples. We see the Spirit work for unity in two ways. On the one hand, He drives the Church outwards, so that she can welcome an ever-greater number of people and peoples; on the other hand, she gathers them within to consolidate the unity achieved. He teaches her to expand in universality, and consolidate in unity. Universal and one: this is the mystery of the Church. The second movement of the Holy Spirit – that which creates unity – is seen in action in Chapter 15 of the Acts, in the proceedings of the so-called Council of Jerusalem. The problem is how to ensure that the universality achieved does not compromise the unity of the Church. The Holy Spirit does not always create unity suddenly, with miraculous and decisive actions, as at Pentecost. He also does so – and in the majority of cases – with discreet work, respecting human time and differences, passing through people and institutions, prayer and confrontation. In, we would say today, a synodal manner. Indeed, this is what happens at the Council of Jerusalem, regarding the matter of the obligations of the Mosaic Law to be imposed on those who converted from paganism. The solution was announced to the entire Church, with the well-known words: “For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us…” (Acts 15:28). Saint Augustine explains the unity achieved by the Holy Spirit with an image, which has become classic: “How the soul is of the body of man is the holy Spirit of the body of Christ, which is the Church”. The image helps us to understand something important. The Holy Spirit does not create the unity of the Church from the outside; He does not limit Himself to commanding us to be united. He Himself is the “bond of unity”. It is He who creates the unity of the Church. As always, we will conclude with a thought that helps us to pass from the Church as a whole to each one of us. The unity of the Church is the unity between people and is not achieved on the drawing board, but in life. It is implemented in life. We all want unity, we all desire it from the depths of our heart; and yet it is so difficult to attain that, even within marriage and the family, union and concord are among the most difficult things to achieve and even harder to maintain. The reason why unity amog us is difficult is that, yes, everyone wants unity, but based on one’s own point of view, without considering that the other person in front of him thinks exactly the same thing about his “own” point of view. In this way, unity becomes even more elusive. The unity life, the unity of Pentecost, according to the Spirit, is achieved when one makes the effort to put God, not oneself, at the centre. Christian unity is built in this way too: not waiting for others to reach us where we are, but moving together towards Christ.  (October 9, 2024)

Musical Selection

Collect

²² We know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now. ²³ Not only so, but ourselves also, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for adoption, the redemption of our body. ²⁴ For we were saved in hope, but hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for that which he sees? ²⁵ But if we hope for that which we don’t see, we wait for it with patience.  ²⁶ In the same way, the Spirit also helps our weaknesses, for we don’t know how to pray as we ought. But the Spirit himself makes intercession for us with groanings which can’t be uttered. ²⁷ He who searches the hearts knows what is on the Spirit’s mind, because he makes intercession for the saints according to God.

Meditation

The Holy Spirit is both the subject and object of Christian prayer. That is, he is the One who gives prayer and he is the One who is given by prayer. We pray to receive the Holy Spirit, and we receive the Holy Spirit in order to truly pray, that is, as children of God, not as slaves. Let us think a little about this: pray as children of God, not as slaves. One should always pray with freedom. “Today I have to pray for this, this and this, because I promised this, this and this. Otherwise, I will go to hell”. No, that is not prayer! Prayer is free. You pray when the Spirit helps you to pray. You pray when you feel the need to pray in your heart, and when you do not feel anything, stop and ask yourself: “Why do I not feel like praying? What is happening in my life?”. But spontaneity in prayer is what always helps us the most. This means praying as sons and daughters, not as slaves. First of all, we must pray to receive the Holy Spirit. In this regard, Jesus has a very precise word in the Gospel: “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit” to those who ask him?” (Lk 11:13). Everyone, each one of us, knows how to give good gifts to little children, whether they are our children, our grandchildren or our friends. The little ones always receive good gifts from us. And will the Father not give the Spirit to us? This gives us courage and we can move forward. In the New Testament, we see the Holy Spirit always descend during prayer. He descends upon Jesus in the baptism in the Jordan, while he “was praying” (Lk 3:21), and he descends at Pentecost upon the disciples, while they “devoted themselves with one accord to prayer” (Acts 1:14). It is the only “power” we have over the Spirit of God. The power of prayer: He cannot resist prayer. We pray, and he comes. On Mount Carmel, the false prophets of Baal — remember that passage from the Bible — were frantic about invoking fire from heaven on their sacrifice, but nothing happened because they were idolators. They worshipped a god that does not exist. Elijah began to pray, and the fire descended and consumed the offering (cf. 1 Kings 18:20-38). The Church follows this example faithfully: Every time she turns to the Holy Spirit, she implores, “Come, Come”. Come! And she does this especially at Mass, so that he may descend like dew and sanctify the bread and wine for the Eucharistic sacrifice. But there is another aspect, which is the most important and encouraging for us: the Holy Spirit is he who gives us true prayer. Saint Paul affirms this: “the Spirit comes to the aid of our weakness because we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes with inexpressible groanings. And the one who searches hearts knows the intention of the Spirit, because it intercedes for the holy ones according to God’s will” (cf. Rom 8:26-27). It is true, we do not know how to pray, we do not know. We have to learn every day. The reason for this weakness in our prayer was expressed in the past with just one word, used in three different ways: as an adjective, as a noun and as an adverb. It is easy to remember, even for those who do not know Latin, and it is worth keeping in mind, because it contains an entire treatise in itself. We human beings, according to the saying, “mali, mala, male petimus ”, which means, being bad (mali ), we ask for the wrong things (mala ) and in the wrong way (male ). Jesus says, “Seek first his kingdom… and all these things shall be yours as well” (Mt 6:33). Instead, we seek the extra, namely, our interests — many times — and we completely forget to ask for the kingdom of God. Let us ask the Lord for the kingdom, and everything comes with him. Yes, the Holy Spirit comes to aid us in our weakness. He does something more important still: He testifies to us that we are children of God and puts on our lips the cry: “Father!” (Rom 8:15; Gal 4:6). We cannot say “Father, Abba ” without the strength of the Holy Spirit. Christian prayer is not man at one end of the telephone, speaking to God on the other end; no, it is God who prays in us! We pray to God through God. To pray means to place oneself inside God, so that God enters into us. The Holy Spirit intercedes and he also teaches us how to intercede, in turn, for our brothers and sisters — he intercedes for us and teaches us how to intercede for others. He teaches us the prayer of intercession : praying for this person, praying for that sick person, for the one who is in prison, praying… even praying for one’s mother-in-law! And pray, always. Always. This prayer is particularly pleasing to God because it is the most gratuitous and altruistic. When someone prays for everyone — as Saint Ambrose used to say — everyone prays for someone; prayer multiplies (De Cain et Abel, I, 39.). This is how prayer is. This is a task that is so precious and necessary in the Church, particularly during this time of preparation for the Jubilee: to unite ourselves to the Paraclete who “intercedes for all of us according to God’s plans”.  (Nov 6, 2024)

Musical Selection

Collect